Web services allow for the exchange of data between applications running on different machines over a network. They use standards like TCP/IP, HTTP, XML and Java to enable direct application-to-application interaction and data exchange over the internet. Service-oriented architecture (SOA) uses a collection of services that communicate with each other to develop enterprise applications. The Oracle SOA Suite 11g introduced the service component architecture (SCA) which allows components to be deployed together as a single unit to a single server, unlike 10g which required separate deployment of each component. Mediators in SOA connect components that expose different interfaces and can perform routing and filtering duties.